1. Technical Field
The disclosure is related generally to electrical conductive specimen testing systems. More particularly, the disclosure is related to a thermal-mechanical testing apparatus for electrically conductive specimen testing systems, and a method for using the thermal-mechanical testing apparatus.
2. Related Art
Physical simulation of material processing involves the reproduction of the thermal and/or mechanical processes in the laboratory that the material is subjected to during an actual fabrication process or actual end use process. During the physical simulation, a sample of the actual material is used in a material testing machine or system capable of subjecting the sample material to the same thermal and/or mechanical processes that the material may undergo during a fabrication process or actual end use process. That is, the material testing machine or system simulates the material following the same thermal and/or mechanical profile that it would in the full scale fabrication process or end use process of the material. Typically, a sample of a material is heated and mechanically worked while various performance parameters of interest are measured and recorded by the material testing machine or system for later analysis. After the simulation is complete, the microstructure of the material may also be examined in order to verify that the material meets expected results and/or to understand the properties of the material produced during the physical simulation.
Depending on the capability of the material testing machine or system performing the simulation, the results can be extremely useful. These simulations have a variety of applications across the materials industry, including, Development of new processes, process improvements, and the discovery and implementation of new materials. When the physical simulation is accurate, the results can be readily transferred from the laboratory to the full size production process.
Two conventional fabrication processes simulated by material testing machines or systems are multi-stand rolling mills and multi-hit forging processes. These two simulated fabrication processes involve multiple-hit, high-speed deformation of the material during fabrication. The material testing machine or system used to simulate a multi-stand rolling mill and/or multi-hit forging typically includes two oppositely facing anvils capable of providing a compression force on a sample material positioned between the anvils. More specifically, the anvils of the testing machine or system are coupled to one or more hydraulic systems configured to allow the anvils to strike the sample material with a desired compression force and desired rate of deformation. Additionally, to properly simulate the multi-stand roll milling and/or multi-hit forging process, the material testing machine or system also provides a system for heating the sample material. More specifically, the sample material is heated during the simulation, to replicate the heating of the material during fabrication (e.g., multi-stand roll milling, multi-hit forging). The heating systems used in the simulation are typically a sub-system within material testing machine or system, or may be an independent system. These conventional heating systems typically heat only a small area (e.g., striking/compression area) of the sample material during simulation due to spatial constraints within the material testing machine or system and the need to rapidly heat and cool the material to replicate the process under study. That is, because of the limited testing space and need to heat and cool rapidly only a small area of the sample material can be heated without interfering with the simulation. In order to achieve accurate results during the simulation, it is imperative that the anvils strike or compress the heated area of the sample material.